You never want your hips to interfere with your hands or the club as you strike the ball. This usually happens when you thrust onto your toes as you start down from the top, an error that automatically moves your body and mass toward the ball and forces you to manipulate your face angle, your path or both. Expect the gamut of poor shots and strikes.

What you do want is to create ample space for your hands and club to work unimpeded. One of the best ways to accomplish this is to control the movement of your trail knee. I like the simple swing thought of moving your trail knee in and down through impact while gently rolling your trail foot toward the target (right to left). These are easy moves that not only will help you not only hit the ball straighter, but a lot farther too.

A good drill is to swing with an alignment stick set just ahead of your trail knee (see below image). Your goal is to simply miss the stick. You’ll notice a huge difference after just a few tries.

Article originally appeared on: Golf.com